Il caso della società europea. La via italiana alla partecipazione di fronte alle sfide europee

The author takes the opportunity of the implementation in Italy of the 2001/86/EC directive on the employees’ involvement in the European Company (SE), by means of the legislative decree n. 188/2005, to conduct a long analysis of the state-of-the-art of employees’ participation in Europe, in the Italian legal order and in Italy. The aim of the operation is a more reliable reconstruction of the interpretative context of the directive, and, as a consequence, of the decree that transposes it. The work is divided into three sections: in the first one, the author analyses legislations on employees’ involvement from the comparative point of view (Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden) and in the legal order of the European Union. The second long section is devoted to the thorough exegesis of the 188/2005 decree. In the third section the author concludes the work by taking into consideration the employees’ participation in Italy: he finds serious weaknesses in the so called “Italian way” to the industrial democracy, which have favoured an excessive antagonism of our system of industrial relations and have discouraged social partners from realising a genuine cooperative play. In conclusion, the author suggests the essentials contours of a reform that could allow to overtake the excessive antagonism which characterises the Italian landscape of industrial relations.